Autodesk 2014 Design and Creation Suites marry desktop and cloud

The new Autodesk Design and Creation Suites offer unprecedented access to the Autodesk 2014 software portfolio spanning the desktop and cloud and allow building, product, plant, and factory design; engineering, construction and infrastructure; and entertainment creation professionals to innovate more. For the first time, the 2014 Design and Creation Suites include new reality capture software and services that more easily incorporate both laser scans and digital photographs of the physical world into the 3D design and engineering process.

The flexible, economical software access provided by Autodesk Suites means designers and engineers have a broader palette of tools to choose from — they can choose the best tool for the job at hand and better respond to changing business requirements. Suites customers on Autodesk Subscription will also have access to select Autodesk 360 cloud services that extend designers and engineers’ workflows to explore more design alternatives, collaborate more effectively and experience greater mobility. Subscription customers now can purchase additional cloud capacity as well.

Andrew Anagnost, senior vice president of Industry Strategy and Marketing at Autodesk, says: “With our 2014 portfolio, organisations large and small across every industry can simply innovate more. Autodesk’s commitment to making our 3D design, engineering and entertainment software portfolio accessible to customers through suites workflows that connect to value added services in the cloud is unwavering.”

A key addition to the 2014 portfolio of suites is Autodesk ReCap, a family of new reality capture software and cloud services that simplify the process of creating intelligent 3D data of physical objects and environments using laser scans and photos, allowing customers to bring the actual job site or physical objects into their design and engineering process.

Rather than beginning with a blank screen, designers and engineers can add, modify, validate and document their design process in context. For example, a civil engineer can bypass an existing bridge or expand the road underneath digitally and test feasibility with accurate survey data. At construction phase, builders can run digital clash detection to understand if existing utilities will be in the way. Urban planners can get answers to specific design questions about large areas, such as how much building roof surface is covered by shadow or vegetation.

The 2014 suites’ industry specific workflows address specific user needs and strengthen compatibility between products. For example, suites containing Autodesk Revit products and Autodesk AutoCAD software enjoy tighter interoperability, so when it is time to import forms from AutoCAD into Revit products, the forms retain much greater integrity, or when it is time to output drawings in AutoCAD, users can generate 2D documentation within Revit products. Suites containing Autodesk Revit and Autodesk Inventor software will benefit from tighter interoperability that allows customers, such as building product manufacturers, to simplify and export an Inventor model into a Revit file format for the construction environment without exposing any sensitive intellectual property.

Better together: desktop and cloud

Autodesk 360 extends the suites workflow advantage by connecting the desktop to secure and virtually infinite computing power in the cloud, helping subscribers rapidly design, visualise, simulate, and share their ideas anywhere, anytime.

Illustrating the power of a combining the cloud and desktop, Autodesk Infrastructure Design Suite 2014 and Autodesk Building Design Suite 2014 introduce Autodesk InfraWorks software and Autodesk InfraWorks 360 cloud services. These new tools help accelerate the adoption of Building Information Modeling (BIM) and cloud-based workflows for the planning, design, construction and management of civil infrastructure projects. Helping improve the civil infrastructure design process by engineering in 3D from the start, the software and services allow collaboration with a broad set of stakeholders on mobile and desktop platforms, and enables communication in new and visually compelling ways. Autodesk InfraWorks allows civil engineers and planners to design within the context of the real-world environment, helping to deliver projects, both large and small, by more efficiently managing even large-scale infrastructure models.

Economical access

Finally, each suite offers an economical way for customers to access their primary design software – plus the complementary software and cloud services needed to more effectively complete design, engineering, or entertainment creation tasks. The 2014 Suites, which come in Standard, Premium or Ultimate editions, offer greater value than ever before:

Autodesk Building Design Suite subscribers gain access to Autodesk Green Building Studio and energy analysis cloud services in the standard edition, as well as InfraWorks 2014 and the Optimization for Inventor cloud service in the Ultimate edition

Autodesk Entertainment Creation Suite customers will benefit from new workflows like the ability to easily generate moving or idle crowds with populate, improved viewport display and shading, and the ability to create production-quality meshes with the new retopologizing options

Autodesk Factory Design Suite includes more than 300 new factory assets

Autodesk Infrastructure Design Suite Premium now includes Autodesk InfraWorks 2014, Autodesk Roads and Highways Module for InfraWorks, Autodesk AutoCAD Utility Design software and, for the first time, a single, comprehensive version of Autodesk Revit products that combines tools for architectural design, mechanical, electrical, and plumbing (MEP) engineering and structural engineering

Autodesk Product Design Suite Premium now includes Autodesk Inventor Professional, and Autodesk Navisworks Manage has been added to the Product Design Suite Ultimate edition for clash detection. Both Product Design Suite Ultimate and Premium customers on Autodesk Subscription now have access to the Optimization for Inventor cloud service.

Availability

Availability varies by country. Suites customers on Subscription have access to select Autodesk 360 capabilities, and subscribers can purchase 100 additional cloud credits for only $100. See details and purchasing options at www.autodesk.com/purchaseoptions. For further information about Autodesk Design and Creation Suites, please go to autodesk.com/.